He said, without meeting her glance, "I don't need women in that sense. If I did I could buy one."
"But that's not you, is it?"
"How do you mean 'not me'? Look here, Edith, you were gaffer of a region here and must have seen most things. You know that men who want a frolic can get one, providing they've got money in their pockets."
"I know that, yes. But it wouldn't be your way and you've probably found that out for yourself."
He was silent, so she said, with a sigh, "Very well. I won't answer it. But if she writes again I'll re-address the letter to you and you can decide for yourself whether or not you read it."
He left her in an ill-humour, and she suspected he was going to drown his sorrows. In spite of what the family was saying about him, it was clear to her that he still had some to drown. But then, within minutes of his departure, her spirits lifted, for Betsy arrived with luggage and asked if she could stay a week or so.
"It makes a rare change," she announced, "for down here it's free and easy, and back home I'm faced with a choice of playing nursemaid to other folks' babies or filling my time with chapel activities. That's the two alternatives open to old maids in my part of the world."
"I'll never think of you as an old maid, Betsy," said Edith. Betsy replied, cheerfully, "No more will I until I'm the wrong side of forty. It was hot and dusty in the train. Can I pop up and have a bath before supper?"
She was calling from the top of the stairs in five minutes. "Auntie Edith! There's no more than a sliver of soap in the dish. Can you throw me a cake?" and Edith, getting a new tablet, took it to the stairhead where Betsy was standing naked on the landing.
It was her nakedness that fired Edith's imagination. Somehow it had never previously occurred to her how comely Betsy might look without clothes that were usually home-sewn and out of fashion. With her flaming red hair reaching as far as her broad buttocks, her high bust set off by a waist that looked two inches narrower than it did when she was dressed, she looked like a Viking's bride and she thought, with a mild rush of excitement, By God, if young Edward could see Betsy now it would do more to put that stupid wench of mine out of mind than any amount of soothing talk on my part. Or tumbling with whores, for that matter… But all she said was, "Here's your soap, Betsy. And over supper remind me that I've a proposition to put to you."
"What kind of proposition?"
"We'll see, shall we?" * * *
On Saturday, the 27 of June, about the time the archducal guests assembled in the Ilidze Hotel, Edward Swann appeared at his mother-in-law's door in response to an invitation for a weekend stay.
He was met by Betsy, who said that Auntie Edith was visiting a sick friend a mile or two nearer Peterborough, and wouldn't be back until after dinner.
"She asked me to cook for you and it's almost ready. Give me your grip and I'll take it up while you treat yourself to some sherry." And without waiting for his response, she grabbed his bag and tripped upstairs where he heard her humming a snatch from the music-hall song, "Won't You Come Home, Bill Bailey?"
In the dining-room a meal was laid for three. There was, he noticed, a bottle of champagne in the ice-bucket and he thought, What's Edith celebrating, I wonder? She doesn't generally run to champagne. Maybe it's her birthday. He said to Betsy as she reappeared, "Is it Edith's birthday, Betsy?" and Betsy said it was not but it happened to be hers.
"I'm twenty-eight," she said gaily. "Isn't it awful? But I'd sooner have a birthday here than home, for our house is strict T.T. If my father thought I was guzzling champagne he'd come down here and fetch me home with a flea in my ear."
"He could hardly do that to a daughter of twenty-eight, could he?"
"Oh, yes he could. I don't know whether you know the north well, but they keep a rare tight rein on the women up there, much tighter than down here. It's still a patriarchal society, and pi-faced with it."
There was something about Betsy that amused him. It was difficult to believe that she was twenty-eight.
"How do you mean, pi-faced?"
"Well, everything revolves round the chapel. No one goes to the theatre, no one is supposed to drink, and cards are the Devil's prayerbook. That's why I spend as much time as possible with Auntie Edith. She's fun, but my people don't really know her. They think she's a semi-invalid, and she plays along with it just to get me here. That's jolly sporting of her, don't you think?"
He hardly knew what to think. For the first time despite her ingenuousness, she was registering upon him as a woman, not all that much younger than himself, a woman with an air of a lively, mischievous child about fourteen radiating a boisterous cheerfulness that was difficult to resist. He said, "Well, make the most of it, Betsy. Join me in some sherry before you serve, and we'll follow up with the champagne. How long is Edith likely to be?"
"Oh, not more than an hour or so, but she insisted we weren't to wait dinner. I've roasted a duck and it will be spoiled. I'll have the sherry, tho', and then dish up. Shall I put on the gramophone?"
"If you like." He looked across at the big horned phonograph on a side table, noting that it was an American model, an improvement on George's latest and George was an Edison Bell enthusiast. "That's new, isn't it?"
"Auntie Edith gave it to me for my birthday, but I'll have to leave it here. A phonograph is only one up from a pack of cards in our house."
"You could get round that. Why not buy a sacred recording and try breaking 'em in with the 'Hallelujah Chorus'?"
It was the closest he had come to making a joke in a long time, and she made it seem a better one than it was, exclaiming, "Why, that's a wonderful idea! They might even progress, eventually, to Gilbert and Sullivan. But I've only got the one cylinder and that's ragtime."
"What time?"
The word meant nothing to him and she looked surprised. "Ragtime. Bouncy stuff played fast. It's called 'Alexander's Ragtime Band'," and she hummed the first line or two of a jerky little tune that he immediately recognised as a recent vanboys' favourite at the yard. "I'll put it on. If it winds down while I'm dishing up turn the handle quickly, for they sound frightful when they run down, like a rhinoceros with the belly-ache."
She switched on, downed her sherry at a gulp, and bounced off into the kitchen, where he heard her singing an accompaniment to the whining, oddly fascinating rhythm of the scratchy recording. He thought, pouring himself another sherry, She's a rum sort of girl. Her cheerfulness rubs off on a chap somehow, yet it doesn't sound as if she has much of a life, poor beggar… No idea Edith's folk up north were straitlaced… As he thought this, he felt relaxed and grateful to her for the lift she had given him, for nowadays there seemed to be nothing much in life but work and sleep.
Her home cooking, to a man who lived mostly in chophouses, was a discovery; brown soup, duck, trifle, and Stilton cheese, eaten with some crisp brown biscuits she had made. Over their second glass of champagne he said, "Don't you have a young man, Betsy? Someone like you should, surely? More than one, maybe."
"Most women are married at my age," she said, "and I've come within shouting distance of hooking someone three or four times in a row, but it always fizzles out. Not on my part, on theirs."
Her honesty made an immediate appeal to him, especially as she illustrated the admission with a wry face but then, as if to demonstrate the fact that she had survived her disappointments, a chuckle.
"I can't understand that. Let's face it, you're pretty, you're good company, you're a first-rate cook."
"Ah, I daresay, kind sir, but I'm also considered flighty." He had to laugh as she went on, "I am, too, but we aren't here for long, are we, and I honestly can't see why most people have to make such heavy going of it." Then with a flicker of embarrassment, "Was Gilda flighty? Surely she must have been to run off like that, all the way to America."
"You know about me and Gilda?"
"Not you and Gilda, or only the very little Auntie Edith's told me. But everyone knows Gilda by now, don't they? I mean, she's famous. I saw her
in that French Revolution picture at the Bijou, in Peterborough. Auntie Edith took me."
He was jolted by this. It had never occurred to him that other people took Gilda's posturing seriously, and as to Gilda de la Rey or whatever she called herself being considered famous, it seemed to him quite preposterous. He said, thoughtfully, "What did you think of her?"
"I thought she was awful. I mean, that kind of thing isn't real acting, is it? No more than a lot of put-on eye-rolling and bosom heaving. I'm sure I could do better than that myself, although maybe it isn't her fault."
It struck him then that she must have known Gilda before he did, visiting here as a child and probably being patronised, as by a governessy sort of cousin. It would be difficult, he thought, to think of two more dissimilar women than his wife and Betsy Battersby. He was pondering this when he heard her say, "You don't like talking about her, do you?"
"Not much, but it doesn't matter with someone like you, that is, someone who knew what she was like before she was married. What was she like? When you met her after she came home from the Continent?"
"Lah-di-dah," Betsy said, promptly. "Very pretty, of course, and clever, but I never liked her. She wasn't interested in anyone but herself. Anyone could see that in a twinkling. I thought then, 'Any man who marries Gilda Wickstead will be asking for trouble.' I'm sorry if that offends you, but you did ask for the truth."
"It doesn't offend me." He got up. "I'll help you clear and wash up before Edith gets back."
They cleared the table together and while relieving her of a heavy tray he noticed the pleasing swell of her breasts. It made him think fleetingly of Dulcie, the overripe barmaid at The Mitre, where he drank in the evenings sometimes, and he thought again, I'm damned if I know why some lively spark hasn't snapped her up long ago. She'd have a lot to offer to the right man. Far more than most, he decided, standing beside her at the sink and watching her closely as she washed dishes, for every time she straightened up after lifting plates from the water her fine breasts rippled, and the evening sun, filtering through a side window, made her hair glow like red-hot cinders. By God, he told himself, looking away hastily, I need a woman and no mistake!
But when they had gone back into the dining-room, she asked him if he knew the Bunny-hug and the Turkey Trot. "A girl I know taught me. She goes to all the hops at the drill hall, but there'd be hell's delight in our house if I went there, with or without an escort. Did you ever learn to dance?"
"Formal dances," he said, "when we were kids. We had a teacher call for the girls and she used to rope me in as a partner. I never took to it."
"I could teach you. You can dance to ragtime; in fact it's better. Here, roll that rug up and I'll put it on again." Mildly surprised at the pleasurable anticipation of learning the Bunny-hug with Betsy as a tutor, he did as she asked and soon they were prancing around the room to the whine of the phonograph. He realised that she was quite an expert, although the new dances did not seem to consist of more than skipping and jogging, steps that he found no difficulty in improvising.
"I say, you're jolly good!" she said, pausing to rewind the handle. "You've got a natural rhythm and you lead well. We'll show Auntie Edith when she gets back. Come on, let's try again." He put his arms round her and noticed that her cheeks were flushed with the champagne and that she seemed eager that he should hold her close, and soon he began to perspire gently, not so much by reason of cavorting in a confined space but on account of the fact that Betsy's sturdy thighs collided with his at every turn and hover, so that he found it difficult to sustain belief in her innocence. She may have been reared in the Baptist tradition, he told himself, but she's picked up the basic technique somewhere. Then the phonograph ran down again and when she made no move to wind it, but remained in his loose embrace, he thought, I'd be a fool not to make the most of this—a man must have a bit of fun sometimes. He kissed her mouth, enlarging his grip in a way that supported most of her weight.
She did not seem to mind in the least. On the contrary, when he adjusted his position so that he could run his hand across her breasts, she gave a definite wriggle of approval, and it crossed his mind that his next move should be a suggestion that they write a note for Edith and go for a spin in his car as far as the nearest woods.
He had no opportunity to put the question, however, for as soon as his hold relaxed slightly she renewed it and began kissing him back in a way Gilda had never kissed him and then he was sure, somehow, that he had been excessively naïve about her, and that she had almost certainly had a wide experience in this particular pastime. He managed to get as far as "Why don't we…" but at that moment the front doorbell rang loudly. She exclaimed petulantly, "Now who on earth can that be…?" and detached herself and went into the hall, where he heard her talking to someone on the doorstep.
She came back holding a folded note in her hand. "It's from Auntie Edith," she said, triumphantly. "She sent it over by Timothy, Mrs. Burrell's little boy. It's to say Mrs. Burrell can't manage with that leg and all the children to see to, and wants Auntie to stay over for the night until Mrs. Burrell's sister arrives from Devizes."
"What did you tell the boy?"
"Well, what could I? There's four children to feed and get off to school in the morning."
"You mean you don't mind staying here alone?"
"I'm not alone, am I? Auntie said you intended staying until tomorrow night."
"So I did but—well, in the circumstances…"
"Oh, fiddlesticks to the circumstances," she said emphatically. "If Auntie doesn't mind, I'm sure I don't, for I'm enjoying my birthday. How about you, Edward?"
He said, with a laugh, "You're a rare tonic, Betsy, especially to someone down in the dumps. You're sure you don't mind me staying over?"
"I'd like you to. I'll cook you a slap up breakfast in the morning and maybe you'd take me a ride in your car, for I've never ridden in one in my life."
"You mean you want to go now?"
"Oh no, not now. The morning will do. If I've waited twenty-eight years to ride in a motor, I can wait overnight."
There was simply no resisting her, and it astonished him that he had hardly noticed her on his previous visits here. He said, "We've had enough dancing on the sort of meal you provide. Let's treat ourselves to a glass of Edith's port and take it in the parlour." He picked up the decanter and two glasses and followed her into Edith's cosily-furnished snuggery where he settled himself on the sofa. It was growing dusk outside now and a feeling of well-being stole over him as she drew the chintz curtains and paused on her way back to him to inhale the perfume from a bowl of roses Edith had set on an occasional table. He had few doubts now as to what was expected of him, and when she passed in front of him he reached out and grabbed her, running his hands over her plump bottom and saying, gaily, "Edith's got a nice sense of timing. Sit on my knee, Betsy."
"I'm no light-weight."
"And all the better for it."
She said, teasingly, "I thought you preferred skinny girls. Gilda was skinny."
"Oh, to the devil with Gilda. Let's forget Gilda for a bit."
"All right."
"Any man in his senses would want you, Betsy, and that isn't the champagne talking," he said, pulling her down, gathering her up with a kind of desperation so that she laughed.
"Here, hold on lad! We've got all night, haven't we?"
She began to settle herself close to him but he said, running his hand over her hair, "I'd like to see you with those pins out of your hair, Betsy. You've got wonderful hair. Let it loose now. It must look even more wonderful freed of that comb and all those pins." She looked at him seriously for a moment, her head on one side and then, getting up again, "I'll have to do it upstairs. It's quite a business. Wait here, I won't be five minutes."
He could feel his heart thumping and was aware of the constriction of his starched collar that seemed to be choking him so that he was strongly tempted to take it off, together with his jacket. But he thought, Here, that's taki
ng too much for granted. But then he heard her step on the stairs and she came in as he was in the act of getting up, her hair cascading over her shoulders and wearing a voluminous pink bathrobe, sashed about her waist and reaching down to her bare feet, but sufficiently open at the top to display her breasts.
"I was hot after all that food and drink and dancing," she said, equably, "and you must be, too. Why don't you take your jacket and collar off while I pour us some port?"
It was as though she had found some secret spring in his character, releasing a man charged with an abundance of tenderness and affection. He had always been reckoned the most dour and inarticulate of the family. "Closer to old Sam, in his mellow period, than any one of them," Adam would say of him, and then his late-flowering high spirits had been checked and turned back by the monstrous assault on his pride.
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